5 comments about Programming in Visual Basic 6.0 with Working Model CD-ROM.

1. I am using this book to teach my 9 year old Visual basic as his first programming language.He has previously had some nonformal experience with VB ( simple games, animations etc with VB ) I find that the Bradley book is ideal for him. It covers the mildly boring bits of VB fairly well.

   ( meanwhile I am teaching my 13 year old Scheme , his 3rd programming language)




2. This is the first book I read about computer programming. I have no problem understanding the concepts introduced by this book. But the errors in the programming examples make this book a very frustrating one. I do not recommand this book for these who want to learn Visual Basic by themself. It is a good exercise for someone who knows VB to find out errors in this book.



3. This book seems to get poor reviews for some reason. This book is a great value because of its price and easy to use format. It is true that this book seems to be geared for BEGINNERS, but Visual Basic is a pretty BEGINNER style of programming. If you have programming experience, you may want to try more challenging books. If you are new to Visual Basic or programming altogether, this book is for you. It even comes with a CD which gives you a VISUAL BASIC 6.0 program to use! Overall the value is super. How many computer text books with the program included can you find for this reasonable of a price. So as others may find this book to "simple," I like the overall value, easy readability, and format of this book.



4. I used to programming in Cobol and I did not know to programming in Visual Basic when I read this book help me a lot. Actually I'm coding in Visual Basic and all my foundation is from this book. However, I believe it is the best books for beginner and low advanced programmer. All the code are easy and simple to understand.



5. Programming in Visual Basic 6.0 is by far the best book for the beginning VB programmer. I still use the book today for quick reference. I tried other books and they just don't come close to this one. Concepts are clearly explained and there are plenty of examples in the book to practice your VB skills. I highly recommend this book.

5 comments about Visual Basic .NET Windows Services Handbook.

1. I read through this book in one go and found that it serves as an excellent reference for those who would like to author windows services using the .NET framework. This book has been well organized, starting from the ground-up, explaining the anatomy of a windows service and goes on to cover advanced topics like threading and installation. A must have for people who would like to write windows services. I hope they would come up with a C# version soon (but C# guys can still use this one as a reference).



2. The book is kept short and precise, very well structured. It fills a lots of gaps currently open in MSDN. It's the only one book you need for writing professional Windows services. Highly recommended.



3. If you like Windows Services, you'll enjoy this handbook. As an entry-level systems administrator, I wasn't exactly sure how I could leverage .Net. I was taught C and C++ for windows services, but not everyone wants to learn, peer review, and maintain that.

   As for the handbook, each chapter did a nice job of keeping my attention (that's good seeing as how I'm a generation X'er) and the overall structure, prose, and subtle humor kept me glued to each page.

   Visual Basic .NET Windows Services Handbook gave me direction and purpose regarding future .Net services on our company's infrastructure. This handbook is a great tool for setting your sail in the seas of .Net Windows Services.




4. the first four chapter was very good in explaining
   how and when to use windows services
   The chapter 5 and onwards was very poor.
   I am expriencing non workable programs and i am currently
   debugging them. no thanks to the author.
   Only the first half of the book is OK. The rest is very shabby.



5. If you no absolutely nothing about Windows Services, I still wouldn't recommend this book. You can find more useful information from one Google search than this entire book contains. Also, the link to the book's code is incorrect. The code is available via another site but is different than the code in the book. My recomendation...keep shopping!

5 comments about Microsoft Mastering: Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 Development (Dv-Dlt Mastering).

1. I have sworn by MS Press books for all my certification exams and have to say that this one is by far the most disappointing. I found it to be too superficial to be of much benefit. It works as a decent complement to other resources, but can't really be a primary resource itself.



2. I have a MCP certification thanks to this book and practice. This book teach you to create components and database application. This book assume you have experience application development with previous version of Visual Basic or have knowledge in Visual Basic. Im instructor of Visual Basic for beeginer and expert and any question about this book or Visual Basic comcepts, please don't waiting to contact me at carchie@prtc.net.



3. I passed the exam by using this book in addition to other materials.

   I thought that this book was very good in providing information on every topic. I especially loved building an application from beginning to end. But if you are purchasing it to pass the 70-176 exam, you will need additional material. For example, combining this with MSDN and Transcender is a pretty good combination. I also purchased New Riders MCSD Training Guide. It provided a lot of detail and was quite helpful as well.




4. I passed the exam by using this book in addition to other materials.

   I thought that this book was very good in providing information on every topic. I especially loved building an application from beginning to end. But if you are purchasing it to pass the 70-176 exam, you will need additional material. For example, combining this with MSDN and Transcender is a pretty good combination. I also purchased New Riders MCSD Training Guide. It provided a lot of detail and was quite helpful as well.




5. I picked up this book to brush up my VB 6 skills. Just brush up on them... I've been a VB & C++ programmer for over 7 years. After going through about 4 chapters I noticed that the authors couldn't decide on a level a detail in which to talk about their subject. They give you one topic in detail (several pages) then hit on a very closely related topic in 1/2 a page. Then you get to the exercises to practice and find that they are based on that 1/2 page of explaining a topic. And they tell you to "Please Refer to Micrsoft Visual Basic 6.0 Help" FAR too many times!!!! One thing for sure, you'll be an expert at using the Search Engine in MSDN!!! One thing I did like is the inclusion of multimedia files showing the "author" actually performing tasks... Just when you wonder what the heck they're talking about, you remember to look at the CD for a video. But even those are inconsistent. I say, use it if you know VB and need a refresher or are working with someone who knows VB. Otherwise. Microsoft has let me down AGAIN with this book. Look elsewhere.
   This book is more about how to use the automated Visual Studio capabilities than it is about teaching VB essentials. If you can't write your SQL by hand, then you should be using MS-Access. The Data Viewer & Environment is nice, but a waste...

2 comments about Visual Basic .NET Primer Plus.

1. I would recommend this book to EVERYONE!! I already had a book on VB.NET, and regret that this book wasn't published earlier! The other book that I had on VB.NET had chapters that were as long as 50-70 pages, and very tedious to read. In this book, the author seems to be kind to the reader!! Each chapter is short enough to be interesting, and full of useful information and easily readable - the author has done a great job at explaining the topics with an interesting and engaging tone to the explanations. Each topic is broken down into manageable sizes, so that too much information is not packed into a single chapter making it overwhelming and tedious to read. For example, the concepts of encapsulation, inheritance and polymorphism are usually squished into one endless chapter in other books, but this one has three separate chapters on each topic, with detailed information and interesting examples.
   One of the strong points I found about this book is that it is full of useful illustrations which keep our interest in the topic. There were some diagrams which helped me understand extremely complex and difficult concepts in a matter of minutes - just by the way they were perfectly illustrated. For example, the concept of accessing a database using ADO.NET seemed very overwhelming to me after reading it in my previous book. But this book has a great illustration - a simple-to-understand flow diagram, which explains how the connection object, the data adapter object and the dataset object are interconnected and function to access the database - the whole concept seemed to dawn on me in a moment!
   I think I also benefited a lot after going through the Review Questions at the end of each chapter. These questions encompass all the concepts covered in the chapter, and provide us with close to "real-life" examples, which are much better than the dull case-studies, which present a single-sided perspective.
   Additionally, the language used by the author is not dull and boring - you feel like the author is having a conversation with you, which helps you sustain your interest in reading the book!
   Another aspect of this book that I admired was the fact that the author has not written this book as a technical manual of VB.NET, but has also included ways in which a person can start thinking as a programmer! For example, the five programming steps that the author recommends can be utilized in any programming environment. In short, while reading this book, you don't feel like you are listening to a dull technical explanation, but to a person who is interested in conveying to you the invaluable knowledge of programming as well as the skills of VB.NET. I am very glad that I bought this book, and would recommend it to everyone - I am sure that even people who have no interest in programming will develop an interest for it - and people who already love programming will be glad that they are in the right field!



2. This is the first VB.Net book I've found that really explains the language. I own about 8 other VB.Net books and I'm constantly asking questions like, "why am I typing ByVal and what does it mean?," or "what's really happening when I call a function?" So many of the books I currently own have left me with too many unanswered questions. I'd be willing to bet that as he wrote this book, Purdum was constantly asking himself what kinds of questions the reader would ask. Every new concept is given a thorough explanation. The book gets very detailed about how things work in VB.Net, but it is written so well it is easly understood by a beginner. Purdum definitely doesn't gloss over anything.

   If I had to purchase just one VB.Net book as a beginner, this book would be it. I do wish there were more programming exercises, but if you are creative, you can make up your own...

No comments about Step Into Programming With Visual Basic.NET.

2 comments about Comprehensive VB .NET Debugging.

1. This book is a must read for anyone doing VB.NET development work. I felt so lucky when I found this book because I haven't found a book like this on the market for .NET debugging. This isn't just a book you read through once, and set aside, as it will definitely become a permanent part of your reference library. The author did an absolutely exceptional job in comprehensively covering debugging techniques and issues from everything from ASP.NET, SQL Server, Windows Forms, Web Services, to Classic VB, and the depth of knowledge this author shares about such things as debugging tools, approaches to take towards a project, and how to really fully use Visual Studio .NET's debugger are never taught in college courses. There is even a full chapter on debugging multithreaded applications, which the author even mentions that most Visual Basic programmers are unfamiliar with. I got this book initially to study Visual Studio .NET's debugger capabilities, and learn about debugging techniques, but I was amazed at the volumes of information. This book is so versatile that you can match the debugging techniques to the type of project your might be faced with, and that's why I say again "It's going to be a great reference book to keep handy by your desk." The detailed information on such things as utilizing Visual Studio. NET's debugger is much better, and easier to understand than information I have seen on Microsoft's Website. So many different debugging scenarios are covered, but just as example, in Visual Studio .NET the author explains how to attach the debugger to a process, or how to debug programs without loading them into the IDE, such as a production component that is currently running, or a Web service running on another machine, and gives a very thorough breakdown on the general debugging options in Visual Studio .NET. This book even offers great insight into why bugs even happen in an application in the first place. What I also enjoyed about this book is that I could jump ahead to any chapter I wanted to read. The writing style is smooth, and easy to follow. The examples given are endless.
   
   I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is serious about doing .NET development work!



2. Really enjoyed the discussion on traps and pitfalls, and the differences that the VB.NET language has with C#. Coming from a C# background and having to deal with VB.NET in a later project, had to confront many subtle differences. This book goes very well with ".NET Gotchas"

No comments about Microsoft Visual Basic .NET BASICS.

No comments about The Complete Idiot's Guide to Visual Basic 3.

3 comments about Distributed .NET Programming in VB .NET.

1. I have been working with .Net Remoting for a couple months and this book has more detailed information in it, than I could find anywhere. Not only did it help reinforce the fundamentals of remoting, it explores many advanced topics and gives easy to follow examples. The approach is practical and direct even with difficult topics. This book saved me hours of time by explaining in depth delegates and remote callbacks. I highly suggest this book for anyone working with remoting, web services or other distributed programming topics.

   Also, the code used in the examples can be downloaded from the book's website in C# or VB.NET.




2. When I first started reading this book, I thought "Oh no - 3 chapters of intro and a large appendix". I naturally skipped over the intro and started reading what I thought was the first Real chapter. I kept finding interesting references back to an intro chapter "Introduction to .Net Remoting". I finally read this chapter and was pleasantly surprised to find a clear and comprehensive explanation of channels and contexts. The "This is .Net" intro chapter had a great explanation of versioning in .Net. So I'd recommend reading this book from the beginning - or at least start with chapter 2.

   The rest of the book allowed me to complete a moderately size distributed project in a lot less time that I thought it would. There is also a great chapter on using transactions under Component Services. I was also able the complete my last MCAD certification test (VB XML) based mainly on what I got out of this book.

   This book has no fluff and is packed with a lot of key concepts and practical code samples. The only downside was the brief coverage and dismissal of Web Services. The Appendix turned out to be coverage of ADO.Net written by Andrew Troelsen. I didn't read this chapter because I was already up to speed on ADO.Net. But having read a couple of Troelsen's other books, my guess is that it's pretty good.




3. Very detailed and well explained topics. Tom Barnaby shows MS distributed programing in a deeply manner.
   I think that an architecture chapter or advices about MS distributed architecture would be useful. Anyway, an excellent book.

1 comments about Microsoft Visual Basic .NET 2003 Kick Start.

1. As someone whose Visual Basic (VB) experience extends back to early in version 4.0 and who is an object-oriented veteran, when I heard the early news about VB.NET I was certainly more intrigued than I was over versions 5 and 6. The announced changes were certainly welcome from my point of view, as it appeared that some of the more treacherous aspects of VB were being eliminated. However, the initial response to VB.NET was more negative than Microsoft expected, leading to the elimination of some of the proposed changes. With this as a background, when searching for material on VB.NET, my interest was in a book that concentrated primarily on the differences between version 6 and VB.NET. This book does exactly that.
   Like all upgrades, some of the changes are only slight to cosmetic. Nevertheless, you must learn them, as they could lead to the VB.NET environment rejecting version 6 code. Examples of this are the interpretation of the "Option" statements and the elimination of default object properties. In version 6, if text1 is a textbox, then an assignment of the form

   text1="Hello World"
   
   would be a shorthand representation for

   text1.text="Hello World"

   and acceptable. However, it cannot be done in VB.NET. Most implicit recasting is now disallowed and some data types are no longer supported.
   However, the real differences between the versions are the incorporation of object-oriented principles into the language. Exceptions are now the way in which errors are handled and VB.NET also has inheritance, more explicit event handling, interfaces, constructors and overloading. This new way of doing things can be learned and the descriptions in this book are thorough without overloading you with unnecessary verbiage. Independent of whether you already understand the principles of object-oriented programming or not, if you are making the transition to VB.NET, then you will find the descriptions of value.
   Unlike some other books that demonstrate once again how to build simple projects in VB.NET, which shows you almost nothing new, the author of this book has made the conscious and wise decision to show you the differences, which for a VB veteran, is all you really need.